Chicago’s Aqua Tower wins international design award

The architecturally distinguished mixed-use Aqua tower that anchors Magellan Development Group’s Lakeshore East neighborhood has captured its third and the community’s fourth prestigious international design award.

The 87-story tower at 225 N. Columbus Drive on Chicago’s New Eastside was named both regional and international winner of the International Property Award as Best Residential High-Rise Development in the prestigious property competition. Judging in the competition in association with Bloomberg Television and Google is carried out through a meticulous process involving a panel of more than 60 experts covering every aspect of the real estate industry.  The program covers residential and commercial categories for Africa, Arabia, Asia Pacific and Europe as well as the Americas.

Magellan co-CEO James Loewenberg accepted the award at a Dec. 12 presentation ceremonies at The Savoy Hotel in London.

“We are honored to add the International Property Award to our growing list of design and planning awards for Magellan Development’s Lakeshore East community,” said Loewenberg.

Designed by an architectural team led by Jeanne Gang, principal of Studio/Gang Architects, Aqua already holds two highly-esteemed international design awards.

Earlier this year the tower claimed the highly-esteemed Prix d’Excellence International Design Award in the 2011 Prix Residential High-Rise Category.  The Lakeshore East master plan also holds the 2008 Prix award from FIABCI, the International Real Estate Federation.  Magellan is the only U.S. developer to win two distinguished Prix awards.  Aqua’s third international prize is the 2009 Skyscraper of the Year Award from Emporis, the international building database, besting more than 300 competitors worldwide.

Aqua also holds the 2008 American Architecture Award from The Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design. BD+C